Bears decline 5th year option on Trubisky

[Phil The Thrill]

12 hours ago, ScottLaw said:

I don’t blame McDermott as much as I do Pegula....Whaley should’ve been fired in January, but Pegulas been mostly clueless with the franchises so it’s wasn't surprising.

 

There’s no doubt about this.  Here’s what I wonder though:

 

- Was McDermott given the assurance that Whaley was a lame duck after the draft?  I remember at his press conference he said something like “I’m comfortable with Doug Whaley as GM” as though it had been a fed line.

 

- Did the Pegulas hope things would work out with Whaley, only to be convinced by McDermott that he needed to go?
 

Then in either of these scenarios, did the Pegulas keep Whaley until after the draft out of respect or because they were scared he’d leak draft info?

[GunnerBill]

2 minutes ago, Phil The Thrill said:

There’s no doubt about this.  Here’s what I wonder though:

 

- Was McDermott given the assurance that Whaley was a lame duck after the draft?  I remember at his press conference he said something like “I’m comfortable with Doug Whaley as GM” as though it had been a fed line.

 

- Did the Pegulas hope things would work out with Whaley, only to be convinced by McDermott that he needed to go?
 

Then in either of these scenarios, did the Pegulas keep Whaley until after the draft out of respect or because they were scared he’d leak draft info?

 

I believe initially they felt Whaley and McDermott could co-exist, yes. The Pegulas liked Doug Whaley. But they are a little bit guilty of deciding they like one person and then becoming beholden to them. First it was Rex who charmed them and then got to basically run the 2015 FA period. Then when Rex underperformed it became Whaley who they trusted above all else and then from the first interview they were hooked on McDermott. The good news for them is finally they are beholden to a guy who is actually good and knows what he is doing. I think after the Rex - Doug experience McDermott probably had an easier job convincing the Pegulas that having a GM and HC who were aligned was critical.

[benderbender]

Did someone already say “get er done, Beane?” or the equivalent? Too lazy to check. 

[Bangarang]

25 minutes ago, ScottLaw said:

Either way it's incompetence. 

 

Either you go with Whaley or you don't and that's a decision you make as soon as you fire the previous coach.... Not after the draft.  It cost the Bills an opportunity at two of the best QBs in the league.  

Wasn’t it reported that Whaley loved Watson and wanted to take him?

 

I think of McD wanted one of the QBs available that year then he would’ve taken one. I firmly believe he was the one controlling the draft.

[Bangarang]

4 minutes ago, ScottLaw said:

Pretty sure it was Mahomes he loved....McD wasn’t taking a QB there. He was waiting for Beane to arrive. 

Just looked it up because I wasn’t sure and it was Watson

 

https://www.wkbw.com/sports/bills/bills-whaley-in-love-with-qb-deshaun-watson

Regardless, if we are going blame someone for passing on Mahomes or Watson then it would have to be McD.

 

If Allen goes on to be great then it won’t matter and he and BB will be the smartest guys in the world. 

Edited May 4, 2020 by Bangarang

[Phil The Thrill]

1 hour ago, Bangarang said:

Wasn’t it reported that Whaley loved Watson and wanted to take him?

 

I think of McD wanted one of the QBs available that year then he would’ve taken one. I firmly believe he was the one controlling the draft.

It was reported that Whaley loved Trubisky too.  To be fair, you never know what’s legit or what is planted info.  
 

I have a different take on McDermott.  As an unproven coach, you usually have 1 shot at taking a QB.   Knowing how thorough McDermott is I don’t believe felt confident in the ability to draft a QB himself and he didn’t trust Whaley (rightfully so) Or his staff’s info.  Of course, it’s easy to at one hindsight that he should’ve drafted a QB, but I don’t blame him for making a practical decision.  
 

So knowing that Whaley was on the way out, and knowing that he’d be on a transition year with the roster, he decided to punt on the QB situation 

 

42 minutes ago, Bangarang said:

Just looked it up because I wasn’t sure and it was Watson

 

https://www.wkbw.com/sports/bills/bills-whaley-in-love-with-qb-deshaun-watson

Regardless, if we are going blame someone for passing on Mahomes or Watson then it would have to be McD.

 

If Allen goes on to be great then it won’t matter and he and BB will be the smartest guys in the world. 

also this:

47 minutes ago, ScottLaw said:

Pretty sure it was Mahomes he loved....McD wasn’t taking a QB there. He was waiting for Beane to arrive. 

Pegula reportedly loved Mahomes...for real

[Phil The Thrill]

1 hour ago, ScottLaw said:

Either way it's incompetence. 

 

Either you go with Whaley or you don't and that's a decision you make as soon as you fire the previous coach.... Not after the draft.  It cost the Bills an opportunity at two of the best QBs in the league.  

I agree it was a bad decision, but I think the Pegulas might have been given advice by one of the former NFL personnel figures they allegedly were informally consulting with (maybe Polian?)

 

There’s an old school philosophy that if you fire a GM, you do it after the start of the scouting season after the draft.  It happened to John Dorsey in 2017 as well.  The belief is that you A. Don’t throw away a year of scouting d B. don’t risk a disgruntled ex GM sharing your draft strategy with competitors.  
 

This belief does exist.  Of course, like I said, the Pegulas also might have wanted to let Doug finish out the year as a personal favor.  

[GunnerBill]

13 minutes ago, Phil The Thrill said:

It was reported that Whaley loved Trubisky too.  To be fair, you never know what’s legit or what is planted info.  
 

I have a different take on McDermott.  As an unproven coach, you usually have 1 shot at taking a QB.   Knowing how thorough McDermott is I don’t believe felt confident in the ability to draft a QB himself and he didn’t trust Whaley (rightfully so) Or his staff’s info.  Of course, it’s easy to at one hindsight that he should’ve drafted a QB, but I don’t blame him for making a practical decision.  
 

So knowing that Whaley was on the way out, and knowing that he’d be on a transition year with the roster, he decided to punt on the QB situation 

 

 

This is exactly what happened. McDermott was in control of that draft but he didn't trust Whaley's QB scouting. Nor did he trust Beane's because Beane is not, really, a scout. In fact I would say as scouts Doug Whaley is better than Brandon Beane. Beane is a better General Manager. He is a strategiser who empowers his scouts and personnel staff and then takes all that information and makes the right strategic decision. Not saying he can't scout but he came up in the business on the strategy and football ops side, not on the scouting side. That is why he built a staff of career scouts around him. Guys who have done the hard yards driving around college campuses on their way up the ladder. And Beane couldn't lean on that army of personnel people in 2017 because guess what.... Carolina had its Quarterback. They hadn't really been paying special attention to that class. 

 

Which is why once Beane got here they started stacking assets to get one in 2018. They knew they needed one but they didn't want it to be a stab in the dark. They knew you normally only get one shot at it. 

[Phil The Thrill]

31 minutes ago, GunnerBill said:

 

This is exactly what happened. McDermott was in control of that draft but he didn't trust Whaley's QB scouting. Nor did he trust Beane's because Beane is not, really, a scout. In fact I would say as scouts Doug Whaley is better than Brandon Beane. Beane is a better General Manager. He is a strategiser who empowers his scouts and personnel staff and then takes all that information and makes the right strategic decision. Not saying he can't scout but he came up in the business on the strategy and football ops side, not on the scouting side. That is why he built a staff of career scouts around him. Guys who have done the hard yards driving around college campuses on their way up the ladder. And Beane couldn't lean on that army of personnel people in 2017 because guess what.... Carolina had its Quarterback. They hadn't really been paying special attention to that class. 

 

Which is why once Beane got here they started stacking assets to get one in 2018. They knew they needed one but they didn't want it to be a stab in the dark. They knew you normally only get one shot at it. 

Can you really say Whaley is a better scout than Beane though? Stack their 3 drafts as GM next to each other.  Also I feel that you attribute the success of their drafts to the team and not to Beane.  Seems like you’re throwing out a lot of generalizations here.  

 

The bottom line is that it was a crappy situation created by the Pegulas for keeping in place a lame duck GM during a draft when 2 franchise QB’s were on the board when the team selected. 

[GunnerBill]

4 minutes ago, Phil The Thrill said:

Can you really say Whaley is a better scout than Beane though? Stack their 3 drafts as GM next to each other.  Also I feel that you attribute the success of their drafts to the team and not to Beane.  Seems like you’re throwing out a lot of generalizations here.  

 

The bottom line is that it was a crappy situation created by the Pegulas for keeping in place a lame duck GM during a draft when 2 franchise QB’s were on the board when the team selected. 

 

Yes. You can. Beane isn't really a scout. He became Assistant GM in Carolina without doing any scouting. You don't have to be a career scout to be a good GM. Micky Loomis in New Orleans is not a scout either for example.

[Phil The Thrill]

7 minutes ago, GunnerBill said:

 

Yes. You can. Beane isn't really a scout. He became Assistant GM in Carolina without doing any scouting. You don't have to be a career scout to be a good GM. Micky Loomis in New Orleans is not a scout either for example.

But you are basing this purely on your own speculation.  There’s absolutely no evidence to suggest that Whaley is better at scoring that Beane, other than the fact that Whaley has experience in scouting.  Experience alone doesn’t correlate to knowledge or success - ask Whaleys right hand man JIm Monos who was out of the league and selling cruises.  

 

Again, how do you explain the fact that Beane has been more successful than Whaley in the draft?  We don’t know the involvement to which GM scouting which player.  All that we know are the sections and the production on the field.  To that extent, Beane has been much more successful than Whaley.

Edited May 4, 2020 by Phil The Thrill

[GunnerBill]

9 minutes ago, Phil The Thrill said:

But you are basing this purely on your own speculation.  There’s absolutely no evidence to suggest that Whaley is better at scoring that Beane, other than the fact that Whaley has experience in scouting.  Experience alone doesn’t correlate to knowledge or success - ask Whaleys right hand man JIm Monos who was out of the league and selling cruises.  

 

Again, how do you explain the fact that Beane has been more successful than Whaley in the draft?  We don’t know the involvement to which GM scouting which player.  All that we know are the sections and the production on the field.  To that extent, Beane has been much more successful than Whaley.

 

I explain it by reference to strategy. Whaley had no strategy. He wasn't a strategist. He could spot talent. That was why he was consistently able to find guys on the street who made contributions in the NFL. He knew a football player. What he had less concept of was how you team build and how you develop a culture. 

 

Beane has success in the draft because he knows what he is looking for. They have an identity. They have a blueprint for what a Buffalo Bills player looks like. And he has an exceptional scouting staff. It truly is one of the best in the NFL. I would take Brandon Beane running my front office over Doug Whaley any day of the week - I think he will always deliver better results. But even he wouldn't describe himself as a top notch scout. He understands that isn't his job in a way Doug Whaley never did. 

[syhuang]

On 5/2/2020 at 7:54 PM, Penfield45 said:

my biggest fear for Allen is a Tribusky/Bortles like path 

 

Tribusky's numbers are so similar to Allen's in his 2nd year. Bears fans were ecastatic about entering their 3rd year with him just like we are with Allen, and he crashed and burned. 

 

Bortles went to the AFC champ game and now can't even find a job

 

Do you know who else have similar 2nd year stats too? Tom Brady and Christian Ponder. We all know whether they end up the same in their career. The point? similar past stats doesn't project player development path.

 

Tom Brady: 264/413, 63.9%, 2843 Yds, 18 TD, 12 Int

Christian Ponder: 300/483, 62.1%, 2935 Yds, 18 TD, 12 Int

 

 

 

[C.Biscuit97]

3 hours ago, GunnerBill said:

 

I believe initially they felt Whaley and McDermott could co-exist, yes. The Pegulas liked Doug Whaley. But they are a little bit guilty of deciding they like one person and then becoming beholden to them. First it was Rex who charmed them and then got to basically run the 2015 FA period. Then when Rex underperformed it became Whaley who they trusted above all else and then from the first interview they were hooked on McDermott. The good news for them is finally they are beholden to a guy who is actually good and knows what he is doing. I think after the Rex - Doug experience McDermott probably had an easier job convincing the Pegulas that having a GM and HC who were aligned was critical.

I think the whole problem with Whaley is he didn’t put his foot down enough.  He basically did what the coaches wanted.  He built one of the best defenses in the NFL and Rex and his stupid system blown that up.  
 

what I worry about is this is still McDermott’s show.  He’s always going to get the final say.  It’s why our defensive moves have been really strong bad our offensive ones have been super questionable.  

On 5/3/2020 at 2:08 PM, JaCrispy said:

Dude will be outta the league in two years imo...

If Matt Barkley has a job, Mitchell will have one.  You underestimate how bad he is.  Plus, he’s white.  ? the league loves terrible white backup QBs.  

[Phil The Thrill]

46 minutes ago, GunnerBill said:

 

I explain it by reference to strategy. Whaley had no strategy. He wasn't a strategist. He could spot talent. That was why he was consistently able to find guys on the street who made contributions in the NFL. He knew a football player. What he had less concept of was how you team build and how you develop a culture. 

 

Beane has success in the draft because he knows what he is looking for. They have an identity. They have a blueprint for what a Buffalo Bills player looks like. And he has an exceptional scouting staff. It truly is one of the best in the NFL. I would take Brandon Beane running my front office over Doug Whaley any day of the week - I think he will always deliver better results. But even he wouldn't describe himself as a top notch scout. He understands that isn't his job in a way Doug Whaley never did. 

I think we’re talking about one specific area where Doug had success.  That was finding players off the street that could come in and contribute.  I’ll give you that - he did an excellent job within that niche of scouting.

 

But Doug’s draft history is suspect at best.  

 

- Is that why he drafted EJ as a franchise QB?

- How about when he doubled down on EJ and traded 2 #1’s for a “generational talents like Sammy Watkins?

- How about wasting a 2nd round pick on Cyrus Kuandjio?  
- Or a 2nd on Reggie Ragland?

How about Doug’s big free agent signings like the terrible deals he gave to Marcel Dareus or Charles Clay which badly hurt the team.  
 

So if you want to say Whaley is better at spotting street free agents, I can give you that.  I still don’t feel you can use factual evidence to definitively say he’s a better scout than Beane.  

16 minutes ago, ScottLaw said:

Ok. So you don’t want to throw away a year of scouting but your not even going to use it to your benefit such as taking a QB because you don’t trust the guys who did the scouting to begin with? Whaley was guna call up the Patriots and let them know what the Bills draft strategy was in January? How does that make any sense?
 

I don’t know. It’s not a productive philosophy in my opinion. Whaley should’ve been fired immediately after McDermott was hired. It was indecisive and incompetent behavior that hopefully didn’t cost them a franchise QB assuming Allen pans out. 

I agree 100%.  Either the Pegulas were sold a bill of goods by an old football executive or they wanted to give Doug a second chance because they liked him.  
 

In either situation it was the wrong move

[C.Biscuit97]

4 minutes ago, Phil The Thrill said:

I think we’re talking about one specific area where Doug had success.  That was finding players off the street that could come in and contribute.  I’ll give you that - he did an excellent job within that niche of scouting.

 

But Doug’s draft history is suspect at best.  

 

- Is that why he drafted EJ as a franchise QB?

- How about when he doubled down on EJ and traded 2 #1’s for a “generational talents like Sammy Watkins?

- How about wasting a 2nd round pick on Cyrus Kuandjio?  
- Or a 2nd on Reggie Ragland?

How about Doug’s big free agent signings like the terrible deals he gave to Marcel Dareus or Charles Clay which badly hurt the team.  
 

So if you want to say Whaley is better at spotting street free agents, I can give you that.  I still don’t feel you can use factual evidence to definitively say he’s a better scout than Beane.  

I agree 100%.  Either the Pegulas were sold a bill of goods by an old football executive or they wanted to give Doug a second chance because they liked him.  
 

In either situation it was the wrong move

Lot of hindsight here.  

[SoTier]

13 hours ago, JetsFan20 said:

Idk-He’s talented (picked #2 overall for a reason), but his coach by all accounts can’t stand him and insinuated that he doesn’t work hard enough. Guys like that don’t profile as great backup QB. 

 

The backup QB job is as much about about helping the starter prepare as it is about actually playing in games. 

There is a reason why teams arent lining up to sign Cam Newton as their backup right now. 

 

 

I think that the GMFB crew discussed what it takes to be a backup QB just last week in reference to Andy Dalton being released.  Basically, successsful backup QBs -- Foles, Fitzpatrick, McKown etc -- are capable of checking their egos for the good of the team.   A lot of failed QBs, especially first rounders, can't do that because having mucho self confidence is a pretty much a prereq for NFL QBs so they don't make it as backups.

 

5 hours ago, Phil The Thrill said:

Glad your not my GM....because I can.  These are from from the best group in the NFL.  Robinson had a great year but he’s far from a #1 WR.  The rest of the guys are pretty average for their positions and before last year I’d put Robinson in the average category.

 

Chicago didn’t look to improve this group.  They didn’t bring in anyone new who could compete.    To pretend that this is a stellar group is unreasonable. 
 

I’m not making excuses for Trubisky but I’m just saying that the comparison between Allen and Trubisky is not completely equal.  Allen is getting a major upgrade at WR1 and RB2 in his third year.  Trubisky was not afforded this luxury

 

I think Trubisky's problem was that he  didn't improve and even regressed when team's figured out his tendencies.  I think I heard or read somewhere during last season that some of the Bears' coaching staff were concerned that he wasn't "getting it", which seems to suggest, at least to me, that he wasn't getting better at reading defenses or recognizing coverages etc. 

 

33 minutes ago, GunnerBill said:

 

I explain it by reference to strategy. Whaley had no strategy. He wasn't a strategist. He could spot talent. That was why he was consistently able to find guys on the street who made contributions in the NFL. He knew a football player. What he had less concept of was how you team build and how you develop a culture. 

 

Beane has success in the draft because he knows what he is looking for. They have an identity. They have a blueprint for what a Buffalo Bills player looks like. And he has an exceptional scouting staff. It truly is one of the best in the NFL. I would take Brandon Beane running my front office over Doug Whaley any day of the week - I think he will always deliver better results. But even he wouldn't describe himself as a top notch scout. He understands that isn't his job in a way Doug Whaley never did. 

 

I think that after Brandon was fired, the Pegulas gave Beane the kind of control of the team that most GMs have -- nobody was hired to replace Brandon in regard to the Bills (don't know about the Sabres).  He wasn't subservient to both Brandon and his money guys in the front office and subservient to the HC like Whaley.   Beane's emergence as a strategist really began after the end of the 2018 season.  Before that, he seemed to be scrambling to fill immediate holes and "make do" with very limited resources just as Whaley had done.  Sharing a philosophy for the team with McDermott makes the relationship work even if McDermott is an equal. With a different HC it might not work so well.

[Phil The Thrill]

2 minutes ago, C.Biscuit97 said:

Lot of hindsight here.  

Not really....  At the time there were many questioning these moves.  

 

How many analysts felt that EJ Manuel was a franchise QB?  
 

How many thought that trading 2 #1’s for Sammy Watkins was a wise move?  
 

Who felt that the huge deal given to Charles Clay was wide?

 

Many were skeptical of these moves in the present.  The only ones who loved them were Bills fans, though they’d change their minds months later.  
 

Doug’s track record in the draft is NG

[MrEpsYtown]

I get that they may not have been interested in the QB in 2017, but where is the proof that they would not have drafted Trubisky? Obviously they had zero plans to draft Mahomes or Watson, that is a proven fact, But there is no proof (that I have seen) that they would have passed on Trubisky at 10. I feel like that is something we can never know definitively, unless I am missing something. The Panthers scouted him, they were at his pro day, and he was in their back yard. Whether Beane was leaking info to McDermott or not, coach would have known enough about Trubisky to take him if he wanted, and the owner flew down to meet him? 

 

I get that they were working that trade down for awhile, but maybe they did not have the firepower to trade up. Remember that the Bears traded up one spot with the Niners to take Trubisky, so there had to be another suitor sniffing around for the Bears to make that move. Again, I am not saying the I know anything for sure, I am just saying I want to see the proof that Bills were not going to draft Trubisky. I do believe that they were punting on the QB that year, but I think that decision came when they knew they could not get Trubisky. It is just my opinion and not based on fact. 

[Zerovoltz]

6 hours ago, GunnerBill said:

 

So the Texans not wanting Watson thing is absolutely false and has been rubbished so many times it is untrue. John McClain who is the undisputed number 1 Texans beat reporter, and their HoF voter has ridiculed it countless times. Watson was #1 on the Texans board the whole time and they tried to trade up as high as #6 with the Jets to take him. The organisation was aligned and when they actually fell out over him BO'B and Smith it was over whether he should start week 1. BO'B, you know, they guy you claim never wanted him, wanted to start him week 1 and Smith was reluctant and talked him into starting Tom Savage. "The Texans never wanted Deshaun Watson" or "Bill O'Brien didn't smile after they drafted him so clearly didn't want him" is the sort of post-truth rubbish that gets posted somewhere on the internet and then takes on a life of its own and refuses to die even when reputable sources repeatedly say "it just isn't true." I don't care what you have read on the Chiefs message boards. It is wrong. Watson was the Texans #1 QB. He shouldn't have been, he should been #2 behind Mahomes, clearly. But he was their top guy the whole way through the process.

 

Oh and Blake Bortles is currently out of football. He was the LAR backup last year but he is currently a free agent.

 

I didn't say "The Texans"   I said specifically, BILL O'BRIEN did not want him.  Here is a picture of the Texans War Room when they made the pick....does that look like BOB wanted him....does it look like anyone there besides GM Rick Smith is happy about making the pick?